My favorite pinball game of all time: “Slugfest Baseball”

Slugfest Baseball/Pinball Game Play

I started nostalgically searching for my favorite pinball game of all time, back in college, and OMG, I FOUND IT. It was called “Slugfest Baseball” and this pinball game was amazing. I must have plugged 1000’s of dollars into that game – all in quarters.

PITCHING: It would pitch a pinball to you that you had to hit with a flipper with 4 different pitches: Fastball, curveball, change up, & sinker. The fastball & change up are self explanatory, but the sinker put backspin on the ball so it’d slow down right before it hit you. And the curveball would go off to the side using MAGNETS under the game top.

HITTING: Where you hit the ball made a big difference. You had to hit the highlighted sensors in the back for a single, double or triple, otherwise, it’d be an out. If the ball came back, naturally it was a strike. But if you were fast, you could rapidly pound the ‘steal’ button with a man on base and steal with the leading runner.

HOMERUNS: The big exciting moment came when the clean up hitter came up: An actual ramp would lift out of the game top for the duration of your at-bat. If you hit the ball up the ramp with enough velocity, it’d leap into the air and actually hit the upper deck above the sensors – which was a home run.

RUNS=CARDS: For every 5 runs you made, or a Grand Slam, you could actually get a real baseball card given to you. There was a dispenser under the game that would drop your baseball cards like little rewards for doing well. I actually got a Chipper Jones rookie card from the machine.

AMBIANCE: The game’s ambiance was fantastic. It played organ music and had a crowd noise. It had the voice of an umpire calling the balls & strikes, and when you hit it out of the park on a home run, the lights would turn off on the game and explode in a ridiculous celebration of the hit.

TWO PLAYER: The game could be played two player. One person could select from the 4 pitches and the other player would have to hit, and you’d swap after 3 outs. People used to gather around the game to watch people play. I skipped classes in college to finish games until the 9th inning. We must have played that machine into the ground.

…this game is probably the last remaining arcade game I’d buy if I had the room in our house.